


Rising Sun Going Down

by zelda_zee



Category: Supernatural
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-10-12
Updated: 2008-10-12
Packaged: 2017-10-22 09:10:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/236433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zelda_zee/pseuds/zelda_zee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean’s gone and Sam has to find a way to keep fighting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rising Sun Going Down

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Robert Johnson’s _Crossroads Blues_.

Sam and Bobby bury Dean in the middle of a forest, miles from anywhere. No name, no dates, no flowers, just a rough wooden cross to mark the spot. A cross that, Sam knows, will disintegrate to sawdust by this time next year. It doesn’t matter. Dean isn’t going to be resting underneath it long enough for that to happen.

Sam can’t speak, his voice caught tight in a knot of pain, so Bobby says a few words. The 23rd Psalm, a few protection spells. They set the final wards around the grave and leave.

Bobby tries to get Sam to come with him back to his place, but Sam refuses. He just wants to be alone. Bobby’s face crumples and Sam has no doubt that Bobby very definitely doesn’t want to be left to deal with Dean’s death on his own. It’s not that Sam isn’t sympathetic, it’s just that he can’t feel anything. Not a thing. And anyway, he has work to do.

“Promise me, boy,” Bobby says, looking up at Sam out of his rolled down window. “Promise me you won’t do anything stupid. Promise me you’re not gonna try to make another damned deal or try to raise Dean from the dead or any fool thing. He wouldn’t want that, Sam. He wanted it to end.”

Sam puts his hand on Bobby’s forearm and gives it a squeeze, looks him straight in the eyes and says, “I know. I promise. I just want to be alone, I swear. I’m not gonna do anything Dean wouldn’t want.”

Bobby nods once and Sam knows that he isn’t convinced, but he’s leaving and that’s what counts. Sam stands in front of the run down old gas station and watches the trail of dust that Bobby’s car kicks up until it fades away. And then he goes to find a crossroads.

  
“You’re right on time, Sam,” she says with a knowing smile. “I was expecting you. We were taking bets on how long it’d take you to call.” It’s a different demon, of course, but she’s wearing a meatsuit that reminds him of the one he killed, another petite, dark-haired beauty in a little black dress.

Sam’s in no mood for small talk or to put up with her snide taunts. “I wanna make a deal,” he says.

“Well, of course you do, baby,” she pouts. “You wouldn’t be Sam Winchester if you didn’t want to make a deal. So, what’re you selling this time? What do you have to offer that’s worth the price of your brother’s soul?”

“A straight trade.” Sam’s voice is steady, but his hands are trembling. “Mine for his.”

She just snorts, a very unladylike sound. “Not interested.”

“But – your predecessor, before – I mean, Azazel –”

“Azazel had his own priorities. They are not necessarily shared by Lilith, and she’s the one who holds the contract.” The demon smooths her hair back out of her face. “Times change, Sam. Even in Hell, where eternity stretches in every second, times change.”

“My soul –” Sam tries again, knowing that there has to be an angle. He just needs to find it. “It’s – different. There are – _uses_ for it, I know there are. Dean’s just another human, nothing special about _his_ soul. I’m – more than that.” He meets her eyes unflinchingly. “You know it’s true.”

She smiles. “It _is_ true, Sam, and it’s good to hear you acknowledge it finally.” She tilts her head and gives him a long, assessing look. He feels a tiny flicker of hope, forces any hint of it out of his expression.

She just shakes her head. “But that train done left the station, Sammy boy. You should’ve grabbed the chance when you had it. As Azazel’s Chosen you could have saved whoever you wanted. You could have kept your brother by your side for all eternity. You would have liked that, wouldn’t you? Dean following you around everywhere you went like your little pet.”

“Fuck you,’ he says, but there isn’t any vehemence behind it.

“Hell thrives on human souls, Sam. Your brother’s, it’s –” She takes a deep breath, getting a dreamy, faraway look in her eyes. “ _Fresh_. Pure, if you know what I mean – despite how convinced he is that he deserves to be damned. It’s a nice, juicy one, seasoned with all that guilt and self-loathing, all that wasted effort he put into trying to be good. He never would have made it down our way in the normal course of things. No, he was heaven-bent, Sammy, if he hadn’t made the deal that saved your life. There’s really nothing better, when it comes to a human soul. It’s like filet mignon, when we’re used to getting hamburger.” She’s got an avid, hungry look on her face and Sam swallows hard, feeling his stomach roll. That little flicker of hope goes out and he’s filled with nausea and desperation.

The demon circles him, moving slowly. Sam stays where he is, stares straight ahead. “You, Sam, you’re… _corrupted_. Not quite as tasty, you see. No offense, I’m just trying to be honest with you.”

“None taken,” Sam grits out.

“Lots of corrupt souls in Hell, Sam. Nothing special about that.” She shrugs. “And anyway, Lilith’s calling the shots now, and Lilith’s not Azazel. She doesn’t have any use for your soul.”

Sam breathes harshly. His heart’s pounding so hard it feels like it’s going to explode. “I could – I’d serve her.” The words come out choked, barely audible. “I’d – whatever she wants. Anything she wants.” He grimaces, works the word out through a wall of disgust. “ _Please_.”

The demon stands right in front of Sam, so close that the smell of sulfur makes his throat close up. She reaches up and trails her fingertips along his jaw, over his mouth. Her touch burns and tingles on his skin. “Pretty when you beg,” she whispers. Sam shudders. “If it was up to me, I’d take you Sammy, just to hear that pretty sound over and over.” His eyes fill with tears. It isn’t working. It isn’t working and he doesn’t know what he can do to fix it.

She sighs, and her eyes turn to black. “You’re damaged goods, Sam. Yesterday’s news. You thought you were too good for us, didn’t you? But now nobody wants you anymore - Daddy’s gone, and to tell you the truth, no one else really gives a shit what you do with your soul.”

Sam closes his eyes, dizzy. His fingernails are digging into his palms, the pain of it keeping him focused. “I want to talk to her – to Lilith.”

“Gee, Sam,” the demon says, smiling up at him. “She’s kinda busy at the moment. She’s making a point to be sure your brother feels nice and welcome down below. She hadn’t planned to be there in person, but since you sent her back she’s managed to fit it into her schedule. You know, when life hands you lemons…” The demon trails off. “It’s really not such a lucky break for Dean though. But then you couldn’t have known that he’d suffer the consequences when you did what you did back there in New Harmony.”

That breaks him. He staggers, goes down on his knees. “ _Please_ ,” he begs, the word dry as dust on his tongue.

“It’s been nice chatting, but I’ve gotta go Sam.” His eyes are closed, but he can imagine her expression, malicious and triumphant. “I wouldn’t want to miss out on the induction festivities.”

He doubles over, his forehead digging into the rough asphalt of the road. He doesn’t see her go, only hears her mocking laughter fading into the distance.

  
That’s not the last time he summons her. He’s not willing to take no for an answer, not until the demon’s got him down on the ground, begging and promising and sobbing and she tells him he’s never going to get to Lilith, that Lilith is never going to give Dean up, and that no demon will go against her. And then she adds the kicker that if he calls her again things are going to get a lot worse for Dean.

Sam suspects that the last is a lie – Dean’s in Hell, how is it possible for things to get any worse for him than they already are? But he can’t take that chance, not until he’s got something else to bargain with. Something better than his own worthless soul.

He drives to Wyoming, the Impala feeling strange around him without Dean’s presence. He’d swear he can sense the car’s uneasiness, the way she’s slower to start for him and grumbles when he turns off the engine. She always purred happily to life the second Dean turned the key, but when Sam does she sputters and coughs before she catches. He finds himself talking to the car, calling her ‘baby’, the way Dean did. He tells her he’s trying to get Dean back, promises her that he’ll find a way. He wonders if he’s going crazy, thinking that he can mollify an automobile.

He can’t listen to Dean’s tapes. He packs them all into a box and stows them in the trunk, behind the duffle that holds all of Dean’s worldly possessions.

The air is warm with the approach of summer, the earth stretching flat in every direction, fields of new grass rippling in the wind. The sky hangs above, huge and empty. It weighs down upon him, eats up the space around him. He feels like an ant crawling on the earth, a tiny speck, inconsequential.

Sam’s been here before, so none of this comes as a surprise.

He tries to open the Gate. It doesn’t budge. He swears he can hear the laughter of demons as he draws the symbols, recites the incantations, but when he looks around he’s alone. He spends a fruitless month holed up in another shitty motel, crouched over his laptop and a pile of ancient books, some that he had, some that he’s nicked along the way, not sleeping, barely eating. He reworks the spell, discards it and tries another and then another. They get darker as he goes along and before long he’s consulting with witches and sacrificing animals and bleeding himself out until he’s so weak he can barely stand, but the Gate never gives an inch. He can’t go any farther, not without a whole other level of blood sacrifice and he won’t go that far. He won’t.

Sam tries summoning the Trickster, but the fucker won’t show. He tries a whole pantheon of pagan gods and it’s mostly a bust and the ones who do answer won’t help him. He visits psychics, but they can’t connect with Dean and trying only scares the shit out of them. He prays, though it’s just because he needs to be doing something, not because he believes anymore. Sam left his faith back in New Harmony, along with everything else in his life that mattered.

  
Sam doesn’t even know it’s her when she shows up. He’s in a dive bar and he’s drunk, downing whiskey shots and ignoring the worried look of the bartender who’s trying to gauge how much trouble Sam’s likely to be. The guy’s got cause, Sam figures. He’s got a fading shiner and a healing cut on his lip from the last time he was trouble. These days – and by that he means the days since it finally sunk in that he’s not going to be able to reach down into Hell and pluck Dean out – Sam’s pretty much trouble on two legs. He drinks, he fights, he fucks. When he’s sober enough he looks hopelessly for the answer that he knows he won’t find. He hasn’t hunted once in the two months Dean’s been gone.

Dean would be disgusted with him. Sam doesn’t give a fuck.

“Hey,” she says, sliding onto the bar stool next to him. He glances over, uninterested, but something about her catches his eye. She’s got a sad, sweet face with big, soulful eyes, like a madonna in a Renaissance painting, only she’s dark in a way those madonnas never are. She’s beautiful, and there’s something about her that stirs him deep inside, that makes heat whisper down his spine, fan out into his body. She’s small, but curvy, with the straight, graceful posture of a dancer. He could pick her up easily, and the thought of fucking her against a wall flits through his mind. He doesn’t try to disguise the way he’s looking at her, but she just stares back at him, a little smile on her lips.

She looks like she could be the crossroad demon’s meatsuit, actually. And in the end, maybe that’s what makes him say, “Hey,” in return.

“You want some company?” She signals the bartender, orders a shot of tequila.

“Depends.” Sam downs his own shot. “I’m not really in the mood to make conversation.”

“That’s okay,” she says as the bartender sets her up with another. “We don’t have to talk.”

She sits beside him as they drink in silence, her knee touching his. She leaves it there, but doesn’t press harder or try for any more contact. The silence between them is companionable somehow, as if they know each other and are already at ease together. Sam glances at her profile – strong nose, flawless skin, waves of dark hair, ridiculously full lips. He thinks of pushing his cock between them, seeing them open wide to take him. He can see his hands buried in all that hair, her dark eyes watching him as he fucks in. He doesn’t think about kissing her.

She nudges him gently with her elbow. “I’m going –” She jerks her head toward the back of the bar, where there’s a narrow doorway, a sign tacked above it that reads ‘Restrooms’. “You should –” She doesn’t finish that sentence either, but the heat in her eyes as they catch his does it for her. She slides off the stool and walks unhurriedly toward the back, disappears into that dark hallway. He gives it a minute and then follows her.

The door to the Men’s Room is open and there’s a guy in there taking a piss. The Women’s Room is closed, but not locked. He pushes it open, sees her leaning back against the white porcelain sink, arms crossed over her chest.

“Glad you could make it,” she says as he closes the door behind him and bolts it.

She holds his eyes as he walks up to her. He’s not really thinking how it’s going to go, he just knows that he doesn’t want to talk and he doesn’t want to kiss her. He’s grateful when she sinks to her knees without him having to say anything, opens his jeans and strokes him until he’s hard, her attention focused on his cock, not looking at his face.

Her mouth is wet and hot and perfect and she opens wide and swallows him deep. He grunts as she sucks hard, her throat caressing him, pulls back to let her tongue trace along the vein. He lets his head fall back, his eyes fall closed, trying to lose himself in it. Her hands slide over his hipbones, holding him. They’re strangely strong as he tries to push against her, keeping him in place so she can tease over his cockhead with light, wicked flicks of her tongue and gentle, caressing sucks. He looks down and groans out loud at what he sees, his cock, rock hard and flushed, filling up her pretty mouth, her lips stretched wide around him. He uncurls his fingers from where he was gripping the sink, cards them through the hair at her temple. Her eyes snap to his and they’re so bright that they’re almost glowing. There’s a look in them he can’t name, but it makes him think of the crossroads demon, the look in her eye when she turned him down.

Sam pushes her off of him, lifts her to her feet, shoves her against the sink, thinks better of it when he catches his reflection in the mirror and manhandles her over against the wall instead. She’s already working her jeans open, stripping them off, then her underwear while he rolls the condom on. He looks up when he’s done and sees that she’s bare, no hair at all, and _fuckfuckfuck_. Sam’s cock jerks hard in his hand. He makes a noise, some kind of strangled moan and she smiles and trails a forefinger down her body until it slips between the lips of her pussy.

He picks her up, just like he’d imagined when he was sitting at the bar, his hands digging into the cheeks of her ass. She hardly weighs a thing, but her legs wrap around his waist like a vise and her hand feels heavy against the back of his neck. She’s the one who reaches down and brings him against her, rubs her clit against the tip of his cock and growls deep in her throat. She’s dripping wet and the slick, smooth folds of her pussy feel inhumanly soft against him, wetness smearing over his dick. He gasps, tries to catch his breath, but she raises up, her legs tightening around him, and impales herself onto his cock.

She moans, way too loud, and he slaps his hand over her mouth, shoves himself the rest of the way in, relishing the way each thrust makes a muffled cry vibrate against his palm. Sam buries his face in her hair, inhales her smoky scent, leans his weight onto her and fucks hard and fast, straining forward each time as if he could somehow work his way in even deeper. Her hand snakes down between them, fingers busy stroking him, stroking herself. She stiffens when she comes, her cry sounding like an animal in pain, her breath so hot it burns his palm. Her whole body goes loose and liquid, everything except her cunt, which clings so tight and hot, so goddamned _sweet_ that he can’t hold on, he can’t.

Sam’s orgasm is dragged from him and fights it all the way, biting his lip to hold in the moan, not willing to let it out, not wanting to share that part of him. His eyes are tight shut and all he can see is red, red and black pulsing to the beat of his heart. He comes in a wave of heat and torturous pleasure, shuddering against this nameless girl, panting roughly into her ear, fingers so tight on her ass that he knows she'll be wearing his handprint for days.

Sam lifts his face where it was buried in her hair, and she heaves a stuttered breath. He sets her down gently and steps away, gets rid of the condom and zips up. She doesn’t make a move to get dressed, just leans back against the wall looking tousled and sweaty, head tipped back, watching him through unreadable, slitted eyes.

“Hunh. I guess you really don’t know me,” she says, as if she’s confirming something to herself. Sam stares at her blankly. “Cuz if you did, I kinda doubt that would’ve just happened.”

He’s still groping for her meaning when her eyes fill with black. He stumbles backwards until he hits the edge of the sink, heart thudding, filled with incomprehension and horror. Oh, God, he thinks in a panic. He just fucked a demon. Oh holy shit.

The demon smiles. “It’s just me, Sam,” she says quietly. “You know I’m not gonna hurt you.”

His mind races, discarding possibilities until there’s only one left. “Ruby?” he whispers.

Her smile widens.

“Ruby. God, what the –?” He rubs his forehead, shaking, afraid he’s going to be sick. Jesus _fuck_ , he is so totally screwed. He thinks about what Dean would say. Dean, who’d fucked countless anonymous girls in countless anonymous bathrooms and still had managed to avoid ever fucking a demon. “Jesus, Ruby. _Why?_ Why the hell did you let me do that?”

“Lighten up, Sam,” Ruby says. “It’s not like you’re going to Hell or anything.” She pulls on her panties and then her jeans. “You needed it.” Sam huffs a humorless laugh. “And to tell you the truth, so did I. I haven’t got laid since I’ve been back.”

“Okay,” Sam says. He forces himself to slow his breathing, to calm down, to stop shaking. “Okay.” He makes himself look at her, really study her, but there’s nothing there of the Ruby he knew. He would never have recognized her unless she’d said something. “What do you want?” He knows she’s after something. She must be. There’s no way she’d screw him just for the hell of it.

“What makes you think I want something? Maybe I was just horny.” She smirks, and for just a second he catches a glimpse of the demon he knew.

“Don’t play games with me,” Sam growls.

She regards him for a moment. “How about you buy me another drink?” she says. “After all, I put out. Seems like the least you could do.”

  
They take their drinks to a booth in the corner. She’s switched to beer, but Sam really needs something stronger so he orders a shot at the bar and another to take back to the table. They sit for a moment watching each other in the dim light. Sam can smell the sex on them and it’s making him feel vaguely ill.

“So,” she says as if she’s making conversation. “How’ve you been lately, Sam?”

He glowers at her, and downs his shot. “Just tell me what you want,” he says tiredly, wincing a little as the alcohol burns its way down to his belly.

She shrugs. “Same as before, really. Dean may be gone, but there’s still work to do. I can help you.”

He laughs hollowly. “Help me? That’s a good one.”

“Yes, _help you_.” Ruby leans forward, resting her elbows on the table. “You can’t get Dean back, but I can teach you how to make them pay.”

He looks up at her from under the hair that’s hanging down into his eyes. God, he fucked that poor girl. He can’t even begin to grasp how awful that is. He should be furious at Ruby, should be appalled at himself, but he only feels empty and defeated and incredibly exhausted.

Ruby leans across the table, pinning him with her gaze. “Work with me, Sam, and I’ll show you how to send any demon back to Hell. I’ll train you until you’re strong enough to stand against Lilith herself.” Her hand closes over his where it rests on the pitted wood. It’s so small and pale; his looks monstrous in comparison. “At least you can have your vengeance.”

“Vengeance,” he says flatly.

Ruby shrugs. “It’s something.” She gives him a hard look. “It won’t be enough, but it’s something.”

  
He learns fast. It’s not that it’s easy, it’s just that the power has been inside him, pushing at his edges for so long now that once he stops holding it in it just pours out of him in a flood. He’s got plenty of power, the trick is in learning control and discipline. Ruby’s good, Sam’s got to admit. When she’s teaching the snark goes out the window and she’s focused and serious, working almost as hard as he does.

They eat quiet meals at the diner down the road from their motel, Ruby stealing food off his plate. He gets into the habit of ordering extra so there will be enough. They sleep in separate beds – or at least he sleeps. Ruby looks like she’s sleeping, but Sam’s not sure a demon would need to sleep. Maybe it’s optional. At any rate, she keeps her eyes closed when she's laying in bed at night.

They don’t have sex again. It’s not that Sam doesn’t want to, because God, he does. He really fucking does. Ruby’s got no shame, leaving the door to the bathroom open when she showers, sleeping naked, watching TV in her underwear. He complains but she just rolls her eyes. He wonders if she’s teasing him on purpose, trying to see if he’ll break, but he won’t. He can’t, knowing that there’s a girl in there who doesn’t have any say about it.

The first exorcism takes forever. It hurts him and it hurts the demon and when, afterward, they discover that the victim’s dead, Sam’s not sure that it wasn’t him who killed her. But it worked – it sent the demon back to Hell. His head’s aching, pounding as badly as it did when he used to have his visions, but it worked.

“It’ll get better,” Ruby says, a tone of steely determination in her voice. “You’ll get better.”

It didn’t take long for Sam to figure out what Ruby’s game is. It’s pretty simple, really. She hates Lilith but she’s not strong enough to take her down. Sam’s got no doubt that he wants to stay out of any demon squabble, but he plays along for now, using Ruby’s instruction to help him bulk up his power and hone his control.

He does get better. Every exorcism is a little easier, a little quicker, a little less painful. Ruby’s pleased with him and he tries to tell himself that he doesn’t care.

About six weeks into it things go to shit in the middle of an exorcism. There’s a second demon, one they’d entirely missed and he sticks a knife into Ruby before Sam’s even aware of his presence. Sam can’t stop what he’s doing, not with a demon half in and half out of the body they’ve got confined in the devil’s trap, and there’d be no point in it anyway, because Ruby easily takes the other one out with her knife.

Afterward he stares in dismay at the body on the floor and then at the guy who’s unconscious but still breathing, tied to a chair in the trap, and then at Ruby, at the long tear at the front of her shirt where the knife went in.

“Is she..?” He can’t bear to say it.

“Dead,” Ruby confirms. She bites her lip. “It was bound to happen sometime, Sam.” She steps closer, reaches up to caress his cheek. “Hey.” Her eyes are sad, gentle. He doesn’t know if he can trust them, but he thinks maybe. Maybe.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “I know you’d hoped she’d make it.”

“We’ve saved so many people,” Sam says, his voice quavering. “I wanted to save you.”

There’s a pause and then Ruby says, “She’s not me, Sam.”

He closes his eyes, bows his head, shivers when Ruby’s fingers slide into his hair. “I know. I just.” He sighs hopelessly. “I know.”

  
That night he climbs into her bed. She’s warm and she feels so alive, spreading her legs to let him settle between them, trembling as he runs his hand up her side and over her breast. He kisses her, soft and then harder and the moan that flutters against his tongue tastes like damnation.

He knows what he’s doing this time, knows exactly what it means. He does it anyway.

This is what his life is now – exorcising demons with his mind and fucking a dead girl. Dean would hate him if he knew. But Dean’s not here and Sam can’t fool himself any longer that he’ll be coming back. Sam has to find a way to keep fighting without him and this – it’s not enough, not even close. But it’s something.

  



End file.
